Best Sidelong Poems

I. Sighting

I saw you  
through refracted light-  
a prism of chance  
splitting ordinary into spectrum.  
Wind-tangled hair  
terra cotta and rosemary beneath your nails  
the scent of soil and citrus on your skin.  
You carried mysteries-living things ...

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Act One: the stage and scenery are set
I was told the play, I'd not soon forget
But if truth were to be told
More like the game, whack-a-mole
I needed a hammer, not a lorgnette

Thespians were vying for the limelight
Popping up everywhere, ready to fight
Sarcastic words ill spoken
The...

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If I could be much younger than I am, 
with my time in life as yet too brief
to give me evidence and cause
to change my views.
If views I held.
I would know such simple ways to right the world
and all the people and injustice in it.
I’d...

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The chill of morning, children yawning,
I am tired, the blush of dawning has me
feeling ill at ease, my spirit sags,
I barely reach the second floor.
'When will you return? Is Paris so much more
than you have here?' is my unanswered question.
I drag my heels to breakfast,...

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from: "Me to You", by Alastair Reid

"...write me about the weather.

Perhaps
a letter across water,
something like this, but better,
would almost take us strangely
closer to home.

Write, and I'll come."
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ....

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Do you know what happened 
At 11 p.m Tuesday night
I guess you must have it
However much I protest-
But do you know

Of course you don’t:
The victory of ignorance
Come on! I will enlighten you

I took the bi-valve
Flung it against the tigris
And rescued the two
At the confluence

I danced...

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leave me 
in my solitude
to enjoy the silence

let myself
float on
a peaceful river

I lend my petal’s ear
to the wave
and enjoy it’s lullaby

a moment

my longing begins to languish

the sidelong glances of beetles and butterflies

in my park’s hustle

I hope to pick up early dawn 
greet the dew 
and...

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...inspired by 'Portrait Of A Lady' by T.S. Eliot


On winter days the view outside is nebulous at best,
within, the furniture is as it always was, and I am waiting,
waiting for a glimpse of you to silence my equivocating.
Somber is my attitude, the light is dim,...

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Alt music serenades an aromatic algebra;
delicious, bitter, subtle notes served black.
We dance the math - I swipe, she smiles,
equations we don't know we've become. 

She measures quanta 
in these mathematical grounds, a coffee shop 
where perfect rationality is axiomatic 
and we've all come to get...

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I wonder. . . can you take me to a world 
where ladies fair with ringlets in their hair,
with graceful shoulders bared and necks bepearled
wear gowns that billow as they dance on air?
Around the ballroom floor these girls are swirled
upon the arms of men most...

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here i am in the flesh
no victim levelled in scope
22 catches im cashing
not selling the dope
i watched the sunrise
used to pray sometimes
kids thatd played outside
tho fate did seem unkind
chased a better understanding
even struck with fear
i snuck the beer
tried to duck my peers
i followed a different...

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Ugly Girl

How much accrued opinion
Of fashion magazines distinction
Did it take

How many diets
And days of self-conscious

How much make up 
Did they use
To paint your warm smile
And your sweet bright eyes

How many narrow teases and sidelong glances
And peer pressure enhancements 
To convince you

Ugly girl

How much money did...

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Though I'll remember nature's wonders,
sunsets and the breath of spring,
feel the wind blow through my hair
and know the thrill of sunrise cresting.

We see the universe as dancing,
two such different creatures trancing,
we two will never understand
the private notions of the other,
even if we take each other's...

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We see the universe as dancing,
two such different creatures trancing,
we two will never understand
the private notions of the other,
even if we take each other's hand.

Coming close to your destruction
you will see the other side,
who says who has satisfied
requirements for a better life?
Friendship, if we could...

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The pay is good. The world's abrim
With men in need of dying.
Though being shunned confounds him
Some, he's past the point of trying.

Unwelcome in their church, he prays
Alone for his deliverance,
But can't recall the magic phrase
To jimmy open God's forgiveness.

He looks sidelong at all their locks,
the...

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